Almost anyone who is interested in horse racing will tell you that its extreme highs and lows, in terms of winning and losing, good luck and bad, but especially in terms of its wealth and poverty, are at the heart of its strange appeal. The winner’s circle of every Derby includes the owners, with all the money, and often a celebrity trainer—even people not interested in horse racing can probably call to mind an image of Bob Baffert, with his white hair and dark glasses, or D. Wayne Lucas, same—with a good share of the profits, and then the jockeys, who make the smallest share. And then there are the grooms, the people who actually take care of these champion horses, who never make it into the circle at all. These grooms often sleep on cots in the stables, waking at four in the morning to shovel horse shit out of the stall, then continuing their work til nightfall, when it’s back to the cot and then up again. These grooms make almost nothing. And a very high percentage of grooms are Black men.

What I like about this book is its focus on Eddie Sweat, Secretariat’s groom, widely considered to be a key part of Secretariat’s success. Even a horse with all the muscle and speed in the world, a horse that God built, as they say, who could put away the second-fastest horse by 31 lengths at the Belmont, needs the proper care; without the proper care a horse can spook, can go on strike, can fall into a sulk. Eddie’s approach to caring for Secretariat is at the heart of this book. Their relationship, and the work and sacrifice that went into it, is a kind of epic love story. While I am not under the impression that reading about grooms, and the difficult lives they lead, and the injustice of their scant pay, helps them in any real way, I am still glad I had the chance to read about Eddie Sweat, and I think almost any reader would be too.

At the risk of exposing myself as someone who spends too much time screwing around on the internet, I’ll recommend a few videos: first, Secretariat’s 1973 Belmont race, where he straight-up smokes the competition, moving, as the announcer says like a tremendous machine! to win by more than 25 lengths: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vfCMtaNiMDM

A bit more of a nailbiter is Seabiscuit’s 1938 race against Triple Crown winner War Admiral, which was head-and-head for much of the race before Seabiscuit broke away, and is considered by many to be the greatest horse race of all time:       

 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WVT2MPNCqgM

And my personal favorite, a longshot story I can’t help but make into a morality play, Rich Strike’s 80 to 1 win in the 2022 Kentucky Derby, where a ten-dollar (figuratively) horse comes out of nowhere at the last second, covered in mud, to pass his high-society competition by a nose. If the announcer’s sudden ecstatic vocalizations when he realizes what is about to happen—that the biggest underdog is about to run away with it—don’t move you, I don’t know what will: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wIYD42DV3Ro